1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to call circuit connections between wireless and wireline communication networks, and more particularly, to a method for maintaining a wireline portion of the call circuit connection while disconnecting a wireless portion of the call circuit connection during an idle period.
2. Description of Related Art
Circuit-switched data access has been available for some time within personal digital cellular (PDC) applications. Circuit-switched data access services provide the user with the ability to transmit data between a remote host location and a mobile station for display on an attached terminal device. A prime example of this would be the ability to provide a user wireless access to the Internet through a hand-held mobile station.
At present, widespread acceptance of circuit-switched data access has not been achieved. Reasons for this vary, but a prime reason involves the long setup time required to establish the circuit connection. In even modest data transfer situations, an end user must select between having very long session durations, which can be very expensive, or reconnecting each time a new batch of data must be downloaded and disconnecting after the data has been received, which is time consuming. Long setup times are expensive for the end user since they are charged for the time it takes to reestablish the connection to an application host. Some method for speeding the manner in which a user may connect or reconnect to a remote application and minimize the costs involved would greatly benefit the expansion of circuit switched data access available within PDC services.